When Nicaraguan Independence Day rolled around on September 15, Anastasio Ortiz ’25 was at a loss for how to celebrate the holiday that meant so much to him back home in Nicaragua. Although he didn’t know any Nicaraguans on campus, he wanted to do something in commemoration. So Ortiz invited his friends to his room to listen to traditional Nicaraguan music, and the night became an opportunity for him to share his culture with his peers.
“It’s the little things like this that allow me to celebrate my country and … share my culture,” Ortiz said. “Brown is a very inclusive place. … People understand cultural differences and are very excited to hear about other experiences.”
About 14% of the class of 2026 are international citizens, Dean of Admissions Logan Powell wrote in an email to The Herald with more than a dozen Latin American countries represented. In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, The Herald spoke with three Hispanic students at Brown about the communities they’ve found at Brown and the obstacles they believe stand in the way of a greater Latin American presence on campus.
Anahis Luna ’25, who is from San Miguel de Allende, a resort town in central Mexico, feels there is a great sense of pride among the Hispanic and Hispanic American communities on campus, with students always willing to “share the customs of each other.” Just last week, Luna attended an event hosted by the Latinx Student Union that brought together several organizations on campus for a night of “food, dancing and mingling.”
At the same time, Luna — who said she can’t name more than 10 Latin American international students on campus — feels a sense of disconnect between her experiences and those of second-generation Hispanic students on campus, she explained.
“I definitely wish there were a lot more internationals from Latin America,” she said. “It’s really hard to discuss some things because growing up in Mexico is so different from the United States — there’s always a little bit of a barrier.”
Ana Pereyra Caba ’24, originally from the Dominican Republic, felt the same way. “I have a lot of Hispanic friends — I even know a bunch of Dominicans — but none of them are international,” Pereyra Caba said. “I’m grateful for these friends, but it’s not the same. I was born and raised in the Dominican Republic and there are a lot of experiences that come with growing up in developing countries that I would like to relate (to) someone.”
For Ortiz, the Brown Global Center proved to be a useful resource in connecting her with young international students, but very few have been from Latin America. “It’s very hard to create a community when you don’t hear about (the number)” of Latinos on campus, Ortiz said.
Ortiz added that he believes the University’s current needs-conscious international admissions policy is a major obstacle for Latin American international students to apply to Brown. He decided not to apply for financial aid as a way to prioritize his chances of being accepted.
“We internationals will only apply where we have the best chance of getting in and being able to go, and only a few schools are blind,” Ortiz said. “If Brown isn’t one of them, international students won’t look (because they) know they’re at a disadvantage.”
Luna said she took a risk during her application process by applying for financial aid, which in itself is a more “stressful” and “complicated” addition to the process. “If I didn’t get accepted, I would know that financial aid probably played a big factor,” she said. “That’s something you should know.”
Need-conscious admissions also creates a mismatch in the types of international students admitted to the University and the countries they come from, Luna said. Many of the international students from Latin American countries at Brown tend to be wealthier, which doesn’t account for potential applicants who come from “more unfortunate backgrounds,” she said. “There’s a lot that Brown lacks.”
“Rich countries can feed more directly into the United States’ education system,” Luna said. “Brown needs to be more aware of … the various barriers that can prevent students from applying to schools like this … and build more specific connections within different countries in Latin America itself.”
The university recently announced its plans to go completely need-blind for international students starting with the class of 2029, The Herald previously reported. Powell hopes that, as a result, the University will see a sharp increase in international students from “a wider range of socioeconomic backgrounds” in the coming years, he wrote.
“It is difficult to overstate the importance of this change as a means to better reflect the socioeconomic diversity of our Latin American students and our students from around the world,” he wrote.
Pereyra Caba remembers crying when she learned the news that Brown would be blind in the coming years, and she hopes this is just the first step in the University more actively recruiting applicants from Latin American countries.
This initiative “opens up the opportunity for many applicants from many different backgrounds,” Luna said. “Being need-blind … levels the playing field (so that) you feel like you have a chance in college.”
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